


A cold winter, a helpless spring, a warm summers day

by Honeychild



Series: 3RACHA coven [2]
Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: (but he still loves dark), 3RACHA, Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, Angst, Bang Chan is Whipped, Chan suffers... again, Fluff and Angst, Green Witch Jisung, Han Jisung | Han is Whipped, Han Jisung | Han is a Sweetheart, Hedge Witch Chan, It's not really a crossover but "the veil" is inspired by Dragon Age, M/M, Plants, Romance, The real main character is the lavender fight me, White Witch Changbin, Witches, but - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-14
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2021-01-30 22:08:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21435475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Honeychild/pseuds/Honeychild
Summary: Jisung knew Chan was bad again when the lavender on his windowsill started to wither.Or alternative:The angsty 3RACHA as Witches AU nobody asked for but i wrote anyway because reasons
Relationships: Bang Chan & Han Jisung | Han & Seo Changbin, Bang Chan/Han Jisung
Series: 3RACHA coven [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1611796
Comments: 8
Kudos: 179





	A cold winter, a helpless spring, a warm summers day

**Author's Note:**

> Hi guys!  
I hope you enjoy this mess <3
> 
> (Uhm yeah, so my beta is away and I wanted to post this fic as quickly as possible to get it out of my mind (green witch Jisung kinda haunted my thoughts for days after I read a post about somebody keeping an eye on their freinds well being through plants) so if there are any mistakes, feel free to point them out)

Jisung knew Chan was bad again when the lavender on his windowsill started to wither.

He found it rather depressing that he only noticed because of the plant he had dedicated to his friend and not because he had seen him. Said friend was barely at home nowadays. 

Fall had always been the time of the year when Chan’s abilities were needed the most. With the days closing in, the veil between this and the other world started to wane. Spirits could cross the border a lot easier than during spring or summer, when the stronger daylight kept them away. So naturally hedge witches like Chan got called more often to guide the wandering spirits back home, best before they could turn malevolent and possibly harm someone.

Unfortunately, spirits losing their shit and going berserk wasn’t exactly unusual during fall. The shift in balance regarding the veil made them moody and fearful and it often needed a tremendous amount of force to ban them.

On top of that, Chan, and other witches of his kind, struggled with the pull of the thin veil themselves. They started to feel what was behind it vividly and were more than ever tempted to stay on the other side even when their deed was done. Some got lost this way, wandering in the foreign world half living and half dead.

So, of course Jisung knew his friend had it tough. The lavender always went limp in fall and lost a little of its lively tint. But it never outright withered. It had never shed its tiny blossoms on the windowsill like that or had faded in colour to the point where its purple and green looked almost undistinguishable. 

Chan had to be in great pain, physically or emotionally for that to happen.

So, seconds after Jisung had discovered the poor state of the plant, he had gathered the herb in his arms, like one would a new-born, loving but in utter shock about its evanescence, and had sprinted down the stairs. 

Changbin was standing in the kitchen, mixing and sorting dried herbs into little paper bags, carefully measuring to ensure that the teas in making would later work as they should, when Jisung bulldozed into the room, red hair tousled and out of breath.

“Bin! Bin! Look!”, he exclaimed breathlessly while holding out the lavender so close to the other, that he had to go cross-eyed to see, “He is dying! _Chan is dying_! Oh my god what should we _do_?!”

Before Changbin even had the chance to answer the younger, Jisung had pressed the potted herb back to his chest and started to pace around the kitchen in utter panic.

“Ji listen, calm down…”, tried the older.

“NO! He is withering, Bin! WITHERING!”

“Yeah, I see that, dear, but it’s just his plant. You know Chan won’t die, he is like a tank, plants are way more fragile than him, so please, _for the love of god_, sit down,” Changbin said with as much calmness and sensibility as he could muster, which was not much, while trying to grab Jisung’s arm.

It took a second but eventually he managed to sit the younger down at their kitchen table and even exchange the sad lavender in his hands with a steaming cup of camomile tea. 

The planted herb stood on the left corner of their massive wooden table, back facing the windows to the greenhouse. It stood at the same place where Chan usually sat, the place that had been empty during dinner time for a while now. How could they not have noticed? How?

Jisung sat opposite of the lavender, Changbin still leaned against the counter, rolling a cup of tea between his palms.

“Do you think we should go search for him?”, asked the red-haired green witch.

He was calmer now. Calm enough to think properly at least, but he still worried about the oldest of their little coven. The thought of him desperately needing help, of him lying bleeding in a ditch somewhere and waiting for someone, for them, to find him, had locked itself in Jisung’s mind. It spiralled and turned in his head like a grotesque carousel, increasingly bad scenarios taking a ride on it and showing their ugly faces one after another, in a never ending circle.

“No…”, said Changbin carefully, looking into his now empty cup.

“NO?”, piped Jisung up, on the verge of hysteria again within seconds.

The older of the two shook his head as he made his way over to Chan’s seat. He plopped down on it, taking Jisung’s hands, that were stubbornly pressed into fists, into his own.

“Look Ji, he always comes home,” said the older gently as he rubbed circles on the back of Jisung’s hand, “And if he shouldn’t… That means he is somewhere, where we can’t follow…”

Jisung nodded defeatedly.

“So, we wait?”

“Yeah, we wait.”

***

The usual warm and brightly light kitchen felt strangely dim and cold to them. Silent worry tinging the mood, making the sunlight falling through the window pale and weak. They stayed there for most of the day. They didn’t even bother to open the shop at the front of their house.

Guilt made them restless, keeping them on their feet and working the whole day. Jisung brought more herbs to sort through and lay out to dry from the greenhouse, while Changbin kept on making the little tea mixes their teashop offers.

They both didn’t feel like eating a proper dinner that evening. The opted for crackers and drinking a hilarious amount of calming teas instead.

Time was crawling. Jisung seriously couldn’t tell how they survived until nightfall.

***

It was past midnight when Changbin’s phone rang. Jisung nearly threw a whole basket of sage through the kitchen while Changbin struggled to fumble the device out of his apron.

“Hello?”, he answered the call without looking at the caller ID, shoulder’s tense.

It wasn’t Chan, it was Seungmin. 

Changbin almost laughed from a mixture of anticlimactic relieve and fear.

The younger witch was from a coven they had befriended a long time ago and was one of their closest friends. He called to ask for their help. Or Changbin’s help to precise. Their youngest, Jeongin, had managed to catch a quite severe curse on one of his house calls.

Seungmin’s voice sounded anxious and panicky even through the slight static in the line. Changbin looked at Jisung who was still clueless about what was going on.

“Give me a sec, Minnie,” mumbled Changbin, before turning to his friend sitting on the table.

“Jeongin caught a curse…”, said the dark-haired witch cautiously.

Jisung eyes widened.

“Oh, shit, we gotta-“, he interrupted his sentence before finishing it, “Oh, shit.”

“Yeah, shit”, murmured the older, pressing one palm to his eyes in frustration, “Everything shitty had to happen on the same fucking day, didn’t it?”

Jisung was silent for a second, before he spoke, surprisingly sternly:  
“You go help Innie. I stay here.”

“I can’t leave you here alone _now_, we don’t know what’s up with Ch-“

“Yeah”, interrupted the younger, “It’s not optimal but someone has to help Innie. We can’t leave him hanging either. So, you go and help them, and I stay here and wait for Chan.”

Changbin had rarely seen his friend like that. Jisung was usually more the frightened and soft type but now he looked so… firm? Determined to help his friends. Both his friends. Even if he didn’t know what awaited them in the case of Chan. It could be, that he would need Changbin. It could be, that he had been cursed too and needed a white witch to break the curse for him. Jisung couldn’t do that. But Changbin staying here would put Jeongin at risk. 

Both options were in some way pretty suboptimal and shitty, but the option Jisung suggested secured at least the safety of one of the two.

Changbin nodded, before putting the phone back to his ear and saying:  
“I’m on my way.”

***

Waiting for Chan alone was even more nerve-racking than it had been before. Changbin’s presence had had a somewhat calming effect on him, but now that he was alone, the carousel of bad thoughts was turning again. 

And boy did it spin.

With Changbin gone he feared the state Chan could be in even more. What if he couldn’t help him on his own? Never had he been anything but proud of being a green witch, but today, in the chaos the day had become, he felt like he wasn’t enough. 

Ever since Changbin’s departure he had been sitting on the kitchen table, a blanket wrapped around his shoulders and the pot with the lavender right in front of him. It didn’t look particular worse than in the morning, but it had already looked pretty rough back then, so that discovery wasn’t all that calming.

From time to time Jisung gently took a leaf between his fingertips and rubbed it, as if to reassure it.

What should he do if Chan didn’t come home? If he never came back to them? How could he live with that? How could he live without his friend’s silly grins and loving teasing? How could he live without the sleepy greetings in the morning and the arms that snuck around his waist to pull his back against a warm chest when he stood at the counter in the kitchen? How?

“Please, come home…”, murmured the redhead lowly to the plant, tugging at a leaf as if to get its attention, “You heard me you idiot? You belong here. You are needed here….”

A cold shiver ran down Jisung's spine. First, he thought he had left the window open, but he quickly understood and was on his way through the shop to the front door.

Chan.

As soon as the older had opened the fence gate and had stepped on their claimed ground he was able to feel him. 

He came home. He was _alive_.

Jisung sprinted out the front gate and immediately stopped in his tracks when he saw the older.

Chan looked like a walking corpse. His skin resembled wax paper, greyish and translucent, and he dragged himself across the footpath in their front yard as if lifting his feet costed to much strength. Strength he definitely didn’t have. His aura was almost too faint to notice.

“Chanie!”, called out the younger as he went straight for the other.

Chan looked up at the familiar voice. The sight that greeted Jisung made his knees buckle. He had never seen someone so tired. There was no light, no emotion in the eyes that looked back at him. There was just pure exhaustion, pure overstimulation. What ever his friend had seen or experienced. It had been enough. Enough for multiple live times.

“Jisung?”, the pale lips of his friend formed, as he lifted his arms.

Jisung didn’t quite know what Chan wanted to do with his arms, but he fell right into them anyway, hugging him desperately. The other collapsed into him, drawing in a big gulp of air.

“Chanie”, murmured the younger gently into the blond’s ear as he held him tightly,” Everything is okay now. You are home. Nothing can harm you here.”

To his surprise Chan nodded, letting out a shaky breath, then another. Seeing Jisung, finally being home, made tears dwell up in the corner of his eyes.

Jisung gently peeled himself out of the hug to take the shaking boy’s hand.

“Let’s get you inside, hyung.”

***

The worst part had been getting Chan to move again. He had been like a spinning top, that had lost its momentum and needed to be spun again to get in motion. He had used up all his strength dragging himself back home, that now that he finally stood still, he couldn’t move again.

But Jisung got him to walk eventualy, after a lot of coaxing and many gentle words. To the youngest it seemed like it took centuries to get him from the front yard to the kitchen and onto one of the chairs.

Jisung draped the blanket that he had worn minutes ago over his friend and gave him his still lukewarm, half-finished yarrow tea before making his way to the cabinet to search for something that would get some strength back in the other. Ginseng maybe?

Jisung was a little relived, honestly, Chan was neither cursed nor wounded, but he still looked like he went through hell.

It seemed like he had been out in the cold for too long, his fingertips were white, and he shivered like a leaf. 

But what drained him the most was probably something you couldn’t simply see. 

He sat completely unmoving on his chair, staring holes into the air. He was barely present.

As soon as he had a new tea brewing, he sat down next to Chan and started to take of his shoes and jacket. After, he started to rub his hand and feet to get the circulation going again.

All the while Chan’s tired gaze followed the movements of his friend blankly. He still didn’t talk.

When Jisung deemed his friend’s fingers and toes out of danger, he turned to trying to examine his friend’s state of mind. He searched in the other’s eyes. And what he saw, or more so didn’t see, made him shiver. Chan didn’t look like himself.

Gently the redhead cupped his friend’s cheeks. They were cold as well, so he rubbed over them with his thumbs. Chan had closed his eyes at the warm touch. At least he wasn’t completely unresponsive. That was a good thing. Hopefully.

“Chanie?”, whispered the younger into the small space between them.

The other hummed confirming.

Now that Jisung was touching the other skin to skin he could clearly feel the tumult inside him. There was a lot of negative energy ranging inside him, and first and fore most he could feel the exhaustion that was already written all over his friend’s face. Whisps of worry and guilt tumbling through it all.

He could sense the pressure the veil was putting on his hyung. He could receive a faint glimpse of all the calls and tugs in different direction he was getting from the spirits on the other side. It was like standing in a classroom full of people trying to get your attention. It must drive him crazy.

Jisung hadn’t know that the influence of the veil could be so strong on a medium like Chan. He knew that his friend was one of the more sensible ones, that his connection to the other side was strong, but he hadn’t known how out of balance it could throw you, how overstimulated you could get. That it could reach a point where you just shut down.

“Can you tell me what happened?”, asked the younger as gently as possible.

Chan opened his eyes the tiniest bit at the question, looking at his friend with an ocean of pain swimming in his eyes.

Jisung was about to take the question back, to shush his hyung and tell him he didn’t have to answer when he got cut off by Chan taking a shuddering breath.

“I-I almost-“, he started, throat tight from unshed tears. 

Jisung stayed quiet as the other struggled to force words over his lips. All he could do was to keep caressing Chan’s cheeks and making reassuring sounds. 

It took a lot of hiccups and big breaths before the older spoke again.

“I almost stayed…_there_…”

Jisung knew immediately what he meant. He had felt the force the veil had, he could still feel it through the connection of their skin.

“It’s okay hyung”, said the redhead as he rubbed his hands up and down the older’s arms to try and lessen his shivering a bit, “You are here now. You are back in the real world. They can’t hold you ther-“

“No!,” yelled the blond suddenly, grabbing Jisung’s hands and pulling him closer. He looked at him with tears clinging to his lashes and wild desperation in his eyes.

“It’s not _okay_, Ji,” he stressed franticly, but quieter now,” They are so loud. I can hear them screaming. There are so many voices. So many, Ji.”

The younger nodded, trying to calm down his hyung, with low “okay”s and “I understand”s. 

“I’m so tired, Ji”, murmured the blond defeatedly, hanging his head low. He had started to cry again.

Jisung didn’t know what to do. He wreaked his brain, trying to find a solution, trying to find something to ease Chan’s pain.

How could you lessen the influence of the veil?

Chan had explained a lot about the veil to him, over dinner when he asked or simply after one of the house calls he had done to make his story more understandable, but Jisung still didn’t know much.

It was stronger by daylight and weaker at night. In fall it was the weakest. Places where you could pass the veil had to be loaded with old and strong emotion, battle fields, murder scenes and what not. They had to be near the ground or buildings because stones or inorganic materials absorb the feelings the most. That was why Chan slept on the highest floor. 

Maybe that was a place to start.

“Chan”, said the younger, “Let’s get you to your room, okay?”

At this point Cha had gone quiet again, there was no more strength in the grip around Jisung’s wrists.

He just nodded weakly.

***

Jisung was the smallest and weakest of their coven and Chan the biggest and heaviest. To say the younger struggled to get his friend to the second floor was an understatement.

When he finally wrestled Chan to his room and into his bed he outright collapsed next to him. Jisung waited until his breathing had calmed down a little before he spoke again.

“Is it better here?”, he asked as he turned so he could see the other’s face. He at least looked a little less pale. Unless the dim lighting of Chan’s room played tricks on him.

“It’s better… Less loud”, murmured the older.

Jisung nodded.

What else could he do? What else had the older told him? 

“Cedar?”, mumbled the younger, “Chan, does cedar keep the spirits away?”

The older mulled for a second before nodding.

“I think that could work…”

Jisung stood in seconds and was out the door again. He bolted the stairs down and almost run straight into the kitchen table when he reached the ground floor. 

Franticly he started to go through their cabinets.

“Please let there be cedar, please.”

Cedar was known to dispel negative energy and was able to from a protective barrier if lied down in a circle. But would it be enough to shut out the call of the veil and its spirits? Jisung didn’t know, but he had to try at least.

Eventually he found a jar with cedar seeds, but it wasn’t nearly enough to form a protective circle. The redhead felt like crying and cursed himself for not harvesting more… until realisation hit him.

They had a Japanese cedar in the greenhouse.

Jisung felt like a complete moron, but there was no time to beat himself up. He ran into the dark greenhouse. Blindly finding his way through the bushes and trees and the patches he was cultivating until he found what he was searching for.

The cedar tree stood tall and straight in front of him, holding its slim branches gracefully.

“Hi”, said the green witch as he caressed the trunk of the tree, “I need your help.”

It was not like trees could actually speak, but Jisung felt it’s approval in the way the branches shivered softly in wind.

It took a while until he had gathered enough branches and even longer until he was back in Chan’s room. Out of breath once again. 

On his way up he had taken a jar of lavender and one of sage with him as well. He nearly dropped the whole ordeal several times, but he was not to walk those stairs _again_.

Chan still lied exactly were Jisung had left him. Cold sweat stood on his forehead and he was shivering again. His brows were closely knitted together in pain.

It was high time, so Jisung didn’t waste any more and started to lay the branches out around Chan’s bed. He had to pull it away from the wall a little, with the coven leader still on it. Jisung didn't know how he succeeded, but Jisung swore to himself that he would start to go to the gym, as soon as this was over.

At last he burned the lavender and the sage in a bowl and walked around the room to fill it with the smoke of the calming and purifying herbs before putting it down next to the bed. He couldn’t purify a space like Changbin could, but he knew enough about herbs to build a at least decent protective circle.

Only after he was sure he had done everything he could, he dared to look at his friend.

Chan was crying. 

Silent sobs shook his body as tears streamed down his face.

Panic overcame Jisung at the sight.

“Hyung?”, he called out as he made his way onto the bed, “Hyung, what is it? What’s wrong? Is it worse?”

From up close he could finally see that Chan was laughing. Crying and laughing at the same time and for a moment he thought he had failed, that the veil had robbed his friend of his sanity, but then Chan spoke.

“T-they… They are gone”, he stammered between half-sobs and half-giggles.

Jisung stilled in shock. It worked?

For a minute he just sat there, next to his manically crying friend and felt an enormous weight lift of his shoulders.

Chan wouldn’t die. He wouldn’t wither away like the lavender did. Everything was okay.

With the pressure leaving, tears dwelled up in the younger’s eyes.

“Chan”, he whimpered as he threw himself at his friend, “I’m so glad.”

Chan enfolded him happily in his arms, pulling him impossible close as both just lied there, crying.

Dawn coloured the horizon whitish when Jisung lifted his head from Chan’s chest and started to wipe his tears and the ones of his friend away. His fingertips moved tenderly over the other’s blotchy cheeks. Tired but gleaming eyes looked up at him through still wet lashes. 

Jisung had to bite his lip to not start crying again. He only half succeeded. A dry sob slipped his lips.

It was Chan’s turn to console him now. With still weak and shaking fingers he wiped at the other’s face.

“Everything is fine now, Jisung. I’m fine”, he whispered softly,” You did so well. What would have I done without you?”

The praise and loving tone in which Chan spoke only fuelled Jisung’s tears. What would he do without the older? Without those warm, deep brown eyes? Without the dimple he got when he smiled tenderly, like he did in that moment?

Jisung’s face was still between Chan’s palms when he dipped down to peck the dimple on the other's cheek. Then he moved on to his nose, to his other cheek and further to his temple. 

He planted a kiss on every feature of the blond’s face he would have missed, if he had lost him. It would have taken millions of kisses to fully satisfy Jisung, but after a few dozen he stilled. 

He could feel Chan’s breath on his lips when he looked up into the other’s heavy-lidded eyes. The older’s hands had wandered from Jisung’s cheeks to his waist, were they held him gently.

“I’m so glad you are fine”, Jisung whispered before he shyly kissed the other’s lips.

They were soft and full, and Jisung knew they only ever spoke words of love and kindness. Oh, how would he have missed hearing Chan talk, going on and on about the things he was passionate about. How would he have missed those lips stretching into silly grins and warm smiles.

He hoped that Chan knew that he couldn’t let him go. That there would be so much emptiness in his world without him. He hoped Chan felt it in the countless kisses he pressed to his lips and the mumbled “so so glad”s in between, he hoped he felt it in the closeness of their bodies.

Chan had to hold his face in his hands again to be able to kiss him back properly. He had to capture his lips with his own and hold him close so he wouldn’t pull away again to keep on whispering sweet nothings. Chan angled his face to make room to let their lips slide against each other without bumping noses, gently tracing Jisung’s jaw and later his collarbone with his fingertips.

Jisung let Chan lead, let him pull him fully on top, knees either side of the older’s hips and he let him in when his tongue gently prodded at his lips. 

They held each other like they feared that when they stopped, they would fall apart. And maybe that would have been the case.

This day had been enough for both. Enough fear. Enough pain. Enough stress. Just enough.

And the only thing that had given them the strength to make it through, had been each other.

Chan knew he wouldn’t have crawled out of the veil, if it hadn’t been for someone waiting on the other side for him. 

It would have been a too difficult task to do it just for himself.

An infinite amount of fondness filled Chan at the thought of what the redhead on top of him had done for him. It was all so much, he had to pull away from the kiss and look at Jisung.

Soft doe eyes looked right back at him, round cheeks slightly pink, just like his lips were too. But Jisung was more than his soft and lovely exterior, Chan knew that. There sat so much will and strength between those bird bone of his, so much love and care.

“Thank you”, Chan whispered against the other’s lips, before planting a kiss on his nose.

**Author's Note:**

> Oh hellou beautiful human being
> 
> Thanks for reading till the end and suffering with me and 3RACHA.
> 
> Maybe I will write more in this universe. I kinda fell in love with the idea of 3RACHA as a coven. And I really wanna write about Binnie and the others more... They kinda drowned in the BangHan angst... Uuups.  
Well let me know in the comments what you think about that idea.
> 
> (And the title is from the song "fall" by Crush. Somehow the lyrics fit the story pretty well (And I love Crush<3))
> 
> xoxo Honeychild


End file.
